


calls me on and on

by monanotlisa



Category: Fringe
Genre: Gen, Jossed, Male-Female Friendship, Post-Apocalyptic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-05-05
Updated: 2011-05-05
Packaged: 2017-10-19 05:21:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,766
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/197354
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/monanotlisa/pseuds/monanotlisa
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"So it was you."</p>
            </blockquote>





	calls me on and on

**Author's Note:**

> A snippet written mid-Season 3 with a few theories in never-mind.

"So it was you."

Charlie's voice is not accusing, just stating a fact, and just as low and gruff as Olivia remembers it -- remembers it not just from her time on the other side but all these years here, on this one.

Olivia looks away from the shimmering, weaving mass that's the machine, the doomsday device keeping Peter in stasis, him in turn keeping the universes in check -- not to mention balance -- and faces him: the Charlie who has less hair and more scars.

"Yeah." She's not sure he can hear her. The warehouse-turned-ops-centre is still in chaos. Apocalypse averted, but not everybody's gotten the memo yet…or maybe they don't like its content. Broyles is giving terse orders at the far end, while Walter stands a little to close the machine, wringing his hands. Nina faces him, her gestures as calm and gentle as Walter's aren't. Out of the corner of her eye, Olivia can see Astrid too, herding a couple of Massive Dynamics scientists who for good reason look as if their world was just shaken to its core.

But Charlie must've heard her, because he smiles a slow, wry smile. _Eye of the storm_ , Olivia thinks, nonsensically, _he and I are the only ones standing still._

"You're bleeding," she says, and he is: dark red blood is dripping slowly from the wound in his forearm where the shapeshifter's bullet grazed him.

"It's nothing." He rips his shirtsleeve, wraps it around the arm and stops the bleeding, which takes no more than a minute. A minute he spends looking at Olivia. "He said I was nuts, you know?" Charlie flexes the fingers of his injured arm once, experimentally, and steps closer, almost accidentally shielding Olivia from the stomping brigade of the rapid response team. "Lincoln said the idea of you being the double from another world was nuts. Thought he would always know."

"There's a lot of that going around." Olivia closes her mouth again; where did that come from? Oh, right: Shapeshifters and imposters and no one in either universe -- including herself -- ever catching a clue. Except the man in front of her, of course.

Charlie gives her a keen look, getting it but not pressing. He's good at that, always has been; maybe he always is, in all worlds. Of the people she's met twice now, he's the most recognisable. "I'm hoping the only thing that matters is knowing what to do when it counts most."

They both turn their heads to look at the machine. Where Charlie had tumbled through the dimensional hole, gun drawn only to find Olivia -- in the chokehold of three shapeshifters but holding back three more with a circle of fire around the portal and the machine with Peter at its heart -- yelling at him to push the yellow button, instead. To connect the circuit. To help saving _both_ universes.

Charlie had dropped the gun, and he had pushed the button, well aware she wasn't his Liv. Olivia wonders what the etiquette is for asking about your evil doppleganger, especially when said evil doppleganger is your best friend and teammate. The pang is is deep, surprisingly so given the fact she's just lost Peter to another universe sealed off forever.

Some rifts you can't mend, she thinks. But some you can. "Thank you, Charlie. You did the right thing -- like Broyles. Your Broyles."

His eyes widen at that, and she can see how his brain clicks cleanly through the facts: Broyles's disapparance, the return of the Olive he'd always known at the very same time in a universe of inter-dimensional portals. He's Charlie, though: he doesn't question her, or the fact he's been misinformed, strategically and systematically. "He's here, isn't he?"

Olivia's mouth goes dry. "In a manner of speaking."

"Which is precisely what he wants to do." Broyles, her own Broyles, his solid-strong presence dispelling the wash of guilt. "Agent Francis, Agent Dunham. Please join me."

Olivia looks back, but they both, they all knew when he entered: Peter is not going anywhere, not anytime soon and maybe not even long after that.

::

In the Federal Building, Broyles wastes no time but leads them both into his office.

"Take a seat, both of you."

Charlie is wary enough to look behind him, whether their armed FBI chaperones are still present. But they have lost them somewhere after the second security check, which is just as well. Olivia's the first to confess she doesn't know the intricacies of Walternate's plans, but one thing is clear: Charlie was sent across to fight, not to pretend to be a version of himself that does not exist any more. He too sits down.

"I don't have to tell you this is unprecedented." Broyles's precise diction cuts through her thoughts. "An agent from the other side without a mission. Or do you still have a mission, Agent Francis?"

Charlie doesn't look away, sits very straight in his chair. "No, sir."

Broyles doesn't press him for details of his task in the warehouse. This is not an interrogation. Yet. "I assume I don't have to tell you that any attempt to sabotage that doomsday device would be a suicide run."

"Sir," Charlie frowns, "I don't mean to turn the tables, but would you at least tell me what's going on?" He glances around, and his voice is drier than dry. "Besides the obvious fact that I'm in another universe.

Broyles steeples his hands, measured and compelling like everything he does. "I trust I won't regret this. Agent Dunham spoke highly of you, and much as it may slight you, did not think you were one of the conspirators."

Charlie glances at her, and the _What the fuck?_ in his face is so familiar she wants to smirk and twist her little finger at him where it's hidden from Broyles's view, only that this isn't a gesture people on this side use, and also not something this Olivia Dunham has done, ever. Olivia takes a breath, instead, smiles as encouraging as she can manage, given her next words: "The conspiracy to destroy this universe, Charlie. The Secretary -- he never quite forgave our Walter Bishop for kidnapping his son."

Not one but roughly five muscles in Charlie's jaw twitch. "It was that kidnapping that weakened the fabric between the universes. Weak spots. Fringe events. Hundreds of deaths of innocent civilians."

She doesn't know why his words are such a relief, but then again, no; she does.

"Not quite correct, Agent Francis." Broyles leans forward in his desk. "The imbalance between the universes was set in motion by William Bell's and Walter Bishop's experiments to open pathways, but they alone were the reason. The kidnapping itself has been proven to be without direct effect -- well, not on the stability of our worlds." The look he gives Charlie is sympathetic.

If Charlie feels ill yet, he doesn't show it. The knuckles of his hands where they grip the armrests are very white, though.

Olivia isn't a parent, and this is an advantage here. "Walter did wrong, Charlie. But the Secretary lied, lied to all of you -- all of _us_ : there was another way; it was never one universe versus the other."

Now, finally, Charlie looks down, and at least some of the tension dissipates. "This is what the machine was about."

"To be honest, Agent Francis?" There something almost like humour in Broyles's voice. "The only thing we figured out about the device is that it could _also_ be used to stabilise the universes. Which is what we did. "

Olivia listened to Walter's explanations, but although her IQ has regularly caused over-excitement in test situations, she did not quite grasp the exact functionality that entailed keeping the universes in perfect balance, if apart. Which isn't the point, anyway. When her and Charlie's eyes meet again, she knows he understands what Broyles is trying to say.

"No more fringe events at home? No more situations that force us to trap women and men in amber?"

"No more, no." It's Broyles turn to avert his eyes. "You know the consequences of universes separated by impenetrable walls, though, Agent Francis."

Olivia isn't surprised when Charlie nods. She's a little unsettled by the acceptance in his voice, which only breaks a little on the last word: "Am I a prisoner now?"

She fiercely stares at Broyles and doesn't doubt he can read her as clearly as if he were Simon Phillips. Broyles raises his eyebrows at her, but addressing Charlie again, his voice is matter-of-fact: "No. I will however ask you to remain within reach of the Federal Bureau of Investigation 24/7. Your status will be determined in due time."

 _Now_ Charlie rolls his eyes, and Olivia finally grins. Bureaucracy: always the same, everywhere.

::

They provide Charlie with a Samsung BlackJack II, a tracking device he had to swallow that won't be transported any further than his stomach -- Massive Dynamics, at your service, sir! -- and a hotel room at Harvard Square Hotel, which Olivia privately thinks is about as blatant an indirect assignment as could be.

"Hey, it could be worse," Charlie says lightly when they survey the interior of what's to be his temporary home.

Olivia could think of, say, a _million_ ways, most of them involving varying degrees of genocide as opposed to one person each trapped in another universe, but this is precisely why she plays along. Small-scale worries are always safer to focus on. "Really?"

"Sure. Zombie attack from the wardrobe. Vampires under the bed. Bug infestation." He blinks at the last one. "Actually, scratch the latter."

Right. She touches his hand, lightly. "Are you going to be okay, with the --"

"Yeah, I always bring the meds along." Charlie probably doesn't even realise his hand is curling protectively around the slight bulge in his jacket that does not stem from a gun at all. "They don't need replacing for a while."

Which Oliva reads as, Get Walter started on it _stat_. She nods. "Right. Look, I need to check on Walter, and talk to Astrid. But maybe --"

"We meet in the hotel lobby at 7pm?"

The smile's on her face before she even knows it. "You've got yourself a deal."

When she then strolls into Harvard Square at five past seven, Charlie is already lounging in the couch. The couch is brown with orange spots. Olivia blinks.

Charlie follows her line of sight, and the corner of his mouth turns up. "Let's go."

"Where?"

"Is this your fucking universe, or mine?"

Well, point. "I might know just the place." And the thing is, Olivia does.


End file.
